Surface detail

Culture, #9

by Iain M. Banks

Hardcover, 640 pages

English language

Published Oct. 1, 2010 by Orbit Books.

ISBN:: 978-1-84149-893-5

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(10 reviews)

It begins in the realm of the Real, where matter still matters.

It begins with a murder.

And it will not end until the Culture has gone to war with death itself.

Lededje Y'breq is one of the Intagliated, her marked body bearing witness to a family shame, her life belonging to a man whose lust for power is without limit. Prepared to risk everything for her freedom, her release, when it comes, is at a price, and to put things right she will need the help of the Culture.

Benevolent, enlightened and almost infinitely resourceful though it may be, the Culture can only do so much for any individual. With the assistance of one of its most powerful - and arguably deranged - warships, Lededje finds herself heading into a combat zone not even sure which side the Culture is really on. A war - brutal, far-reaching - is …

It begins in the realm of the Real, where matter still matters.

It begins with a murder.

And it will not end until the Culture has gone to war with death itself.

It started in the realm of the Real and that is where it will end. It will touch countless lives and affect entire civilizations, but at the center of it all is a young woman whose need for revenge masks another motive altogether.

SURFACE DETAIL is Iain M. Banks' new Culture novel, a breathtaking achievement from a writer whose body of work is without parallel in the modern history of science fiction.

12 editions

AvonVilla reviewed Surface detail by Iain M. Banks (Culture, #9)

There's a lot beneath the surface

4 stars

The best part of this book is the idea of virtual hell. It's one thing to invent such a brutal religious doctrine of eternal suffering, it's another to play the role of god and actually create hell when the technology allows you to do it. Banks' descriptions of virtual hell are gripping, reminiscent of the nightmarish visions he describes in "Feersum Endjinn".

As a Banks fan I gobbled this book up. Unfortunately I needed to read it a bit more closely because the plot is somewhat intricate and a few threads seemed untied in my mind as a result. It will be worth re-reading as I have most of his SF books.

Frank Burns reviewed Surface Detail by Iain M. Banks

Review of 'Surface Detail' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

I had forgotten how brutal this one was. Not just in the body damage, body horror sense but in the emotional sense as well.
This one is jam packed with ideas. Hell as virtual afterlife. Hell as a commodity to be outsourced. Hell is nothing but a choice. The exploration of these ideas makes this book skip along very enjoyably. If brutally.
It rates 5 stars from me on this re-read due to the ideas. It has a slight issue with a whole character arc being absolutely redundant. Something the author himself cheerily alludes to in the epilogues. To be fair this did make me giggle (I had forgotten about this in the 15 or so years since I read this last) but is still an odd thing not to just cut from the book.
There is a call back to Use of Weapons at the end (again, I had forgotten) which makes me think Banks intended this to be the last Culture book but then The Hydrogen Sonata exists. I remember nothing of The Hydrogen Sonata but I am going to lay off re-reads for a while as I have a huge stack of new stuff waiting to be explored.
Of course, this is recommended and I will say still it is still absolutely relevant and thought provoking.